Car journalists hear, and see, call of the wild at show

The call of the wild lured thousands of journalists and executives outside Cobo Hall Sunday morning, to witness the walk-and-wait of a herd of longhorn cattle. Plans by Dodge executives to hype their hefty Ram 1500 by pushing some steer through the streets of Detroit apparently fizzled when a home-made fence proved too tough to create with just hammer and nail.

Instead, cowpokes held the herd at bay about a block from Cobo, as three big Ram 1500s pushed through the cattle and swung around in front of the crowd.

In bleachers set up for the writers, a Dodge employee handily tossed bags of jerky to the upper tier, a unique souvenir for a longhorn celebration. "I play softball," she said as she pitched the beef.

With longhorns on hold, Jim Press, a recent Chrysler convert from the executive ranks of Toyota, praised the prowess of the new Dodge Ram but found his audience distracted by the antics of the bovine crowd.

Sparing no puns, Press chided the tittering journalists to listen up.

"If you want to stand out from the herd, you've got to work hard," Press said, noting 35 innovations in the new Ram. "O.K., look at truck," he said as the crowd laughed at the scene behind him.

The 2009 Ram 1500 will be out this fall, with a Hemi-equipped hybrid slated for 2010. No word on the fate of the herd.